Unless otherwise indicated herein, the materials described in this section are not prior art to the claims in this application and are not admitted to be prior art by inclusion in this section.
As people have become more security conscious, they have found it necessary to carry around numerous keys and security cards and memorize numerous passwords to allow them to open doors to their automobile, house, office, garage, and vacation home, and to enable access to other types of secured systems. New keys, cards, and passwords are constantly being added into this collection as new locks and systems are put into service. As a result, finding the right key, card, and/or password to gain access to a secured area or secured system has become difficult.
Some solutions to this problem have relied upon an omni-directional broadcast of communications signals from a portable security device to automatically un-lock doors and/or gain entry to secured systems. However, due to their omni-directional nature, such broadcasts are prone to interception and re-use by unauthorized individuals.
Accordingly, a need exists for a simplified identification and verification system which makes it possible for a user to easily open locks and/or gain entry to secured systems, without having to carry separate keys and/or cards or memorize numerous passwords for various different locks, and that allows the user to do so without use of their hands (e.g., without having to touch a key, card, security keypad, security touchscreen, or equivalent).